


Reclamation

by thechaoscryptid



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Anko the Meddler, Blind Kakashi, Developing Relationship, M/M, Marriage, Red String of Fate, Slice of Life, references to past abuse, references to violence/injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:21:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28473861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thechaoscryptid/pseuds/thechaoscryptid
Summary: Kakashi lets out a soft sigh, slumps back on the couch and threads his fingers through Uhei’s fur to ground himself before he speaks again. “You talk a lot about how your life changed once Mizuki cut your string,” he says. Then, to clarify, “In the meetings.”“Mhmm.”Tucking his lip between his teeth, Kakashi makes a small noise of thought. “Did it put you off from the whole idea together? Or, well, not soulmates, I suppose, but having… someone?”
Relationships: Hatake Kakashi/Umino Iruka
Comments: 5
Kudos: 125
Collections: KakaIru Zine: Intertwined





	Reclamation

**Author's Note:**

> *pokes head back into KKIR for a hot second* Hello! This is my piece I wrote for the KakaIru zine. It was a great project to be part of and I definitely enjoyed writing these two again ❤️

Kakashi comes into Iruka’s life not like any whirlwind summer romance, but like a soft spring breeze. His presence is gentle, unassuming as it quietly fills the small basement space where Iruka holds these meetings, and Iruka spends the hour he  _ should  _ be paying attention drifting along the current of wonderment about what stories Kakashi might have to share. 

His dog sits patiently beside him, collar jingling on the occasions he reaches down to rub its ears. They’re both quiet, placid—much unlike people usually are upon first attendance. He doesn’t cry, laugh, or get angry as so many newcomers do when reminded that their bond’s somehow different than everyone else’s. There’s no emotion in his face save for a cautious attentiveness, he doesn’t interrupt anything, he simply…

Exists.

Hatake Kakashi  _ exists,  _ and Iruka is more curious than he has any right to be. When he asks if Kakashi would like to share, the other man says, “Not today, thank you.” A faint smile flits across his lips. “I’m just checking things out for now.”

“Ah,” Iruka says, nodding before he realizes that will do him no good. He clears his throat, drawing Kakashi’s attention from where Anko’s just walked in behind his back. “I hope you find what you’re looking for here,” he continues, then looks to Haku at Kakashi’s side. “Haku, do you have anything for the week?”

Haku flushes and ducks, fingers twisting in their lap. “I went on a date,” they say softly. “I liked him a lot, but I didn’t tell him about being born without a string. Do you think he’ll mind?”

Iruka’s on his way to answering when Anko plops down beside Haku and settles an elbow on his shoulder, leaning in conspiratorially. “Anyone’d be lucky to have you, kid,” she says. “And if he doesn’t treat you right, you know where to send him.”

“Anko,” Haku groans, burying their reddened face in delicate hands. “I think he’d tear you to pieces.”

“Wrong,” Anko insists, and as they banter, Iruka settles back to listen and consider. Kakashi does the same, and when everyone’s said their piece, he gets up and leaves without so much as a word to anyone.

When Iruka asks Anko about him later, she only winks in that knowing way she does when she’s got something up her sleeve.

“You’ll love him,” she says. “I promise, Iruka, you really will.”

**

It’s funny, Kakashi thinks, that Iruka’s so curious. He can feel the heaviness of the other man’s gaze, the bald-faced openness whenever they’re in the same room together, and he smiles to himself when he’s back at home, alone again. It’s not unusual for people to stare—Uhei does garner his fair share of attention, after all, and the scars certainly don’t dissuade pitying looks—but it  _ is  _ rare for their intentions to feel so…

Well, he’d say  _ childlike,  _ but Iruka’s anything but a child.

“What do you think of him?” he asks Uhei after his fifth meeting. Tonight was a quiet, solemn affair as they welcomed another, a woman whose bond was pulled so tight by someone undeserving that it snapped. Konan told them in a soft yet resolute voice she didn’t care if this—being bondless—was her life now. What mattered from this point on was that she was free.

Kakashi can’t say he doesn’t understand the sentiment.

He’s never truly cared he can’t feel, can’t _see_ the pull of his own red string. Perhaps he has one. Perhaps he doesn’t. Perhaps it’s as mangled as some of these people, but any way you slice it, it’s simply something that hasn’t impacted how he’s lived his life. When Anko told him months ago about another friend he should meet, he didn’t expect to be curious enough to actually _go,_ but her fondness as she spoke about Iruka was contagious. “You’re going to love him,” she’d said. “I solemnly swear. Scouts honor.”

“And you’re not pushing me into this because you just think I should have someone and am upset I can’t feel a bond?” he’d asked dryly.

“Please, I’m long past that point. If you were really upset, you would’ve gone a long time ago,” she’d said, and that was it. Two days later he’d found himself in Iruka’s classroom at the high school, listening to stories of people bruised and broken, burnt out on society’s insistence upon  _ soulmate before self. _

Two weeks later he’d found himself listening to Iruka’s story of his string being severed by the man he’d hoped would be the one, and now two months later, he’s been laying sleepless for the last three days thinking about the way he’s always been so  _ sure  _ he’s all right with not knowing.

He supposes he still is, eventually, but comes to the decision that for Iruka, perhaps dipping his feet into the dating pool wouldn’t be so bad.

**

“Coffee,” Anko insists, “is not as small as you think it is.”

Iruka tosses an empty plastic cup at her, deftly dodging when she throws it back and tells him he needs to go after Kakashi  _ immediately. _ “It’s not like he’ll have fallen in love with me after listening to me spill about Mizuki running me over with a damn car.”

“Maybe not, but I can tell you one thing—Kakashi doesn’t ask just anyone out for coffee.” She pauses, puts a finger on her chin. “Okay, maybe two things. Kakashi doesn’t ask just anyone out for coffee, and he  _ certainly  _ doesn’t volunteer to go out in public as often as he has around you. So no, he might not be wildly in love with you, but there’s something more than just curiosity there.”

“You think so?”

“I  _ know  _ so,” Anko says. She shoves him away from the table he’s still cleaning, though it’s been spotless for the last thirty seconds. “I’ll clean up behind you. Go catch him, Iruka. This isn’t a romcom, he’s not going to wait in the rain for you forever.”

**

“What’ll you have?” Kakashi asks. Rain drips from his hair onto his cheeks, and from Uhei onto the floor of the coffee shop, and he tilts his head toward the soft sound of Iruka’s consideration.

“Medium dark roast, cream, two sugars,” Iruka says.

“Large dark roast, black,” Kakashi says, elbowing Iruka when he feels him going to take out his wallet. “I invited you, I’m paying,” he says. “Besides, you’ll make him sad if you don’t let me get my way.” He gestures toward Uhei and pays, silently rejoicing at Iruka’s snort of laughter. His chest warms further when Iruka scolds him for having a large coffee at 7 PM, and when Iruka’s fingers brush against his on the table, he can’t help the heat that rises in his cheeks. 

“So where’d you get your scar?” Iruka asks.

“Mine?”

Iruka’s fingers bump against his again as he asks permission to touch, and Kakashi nods. “This,” Iruka says, bringing Kakashi’s hand to the raised tissue over his nose and cheeks. “We kind of match.”

“Ah…” Kakashi lingers longer than he needs to, trails his fingers down over Iruka’s lips and chin before letting his hand drop back into his lap. “Car accident. Got tossed through the window.”

“Was that what, uh…”

“Blinded me?” Kakashi shakes his head, then knits his fingers below his chin. “No, God decided I’d be too powerful with all my senses. I came out like this.”

Iruka laughs but doesn’t say he’s sorry, and as the conversation shifts, Kakashi wonders if perhaps diving in headfirst without knowing if Iruka’s truly fated for him wouldn’t be such a bad idea after all.

**

The world is brighter when Iruka’s with Kakashi. Laughter comes quicker and the way Kakashi lights up when he hears the sound makes Iruka’s chest ache in the best way. Coffee becomes a weekly thing, a way to decompress after Iruka’s long Thursdays, but sometimes—often—Kakashi seeks him out for something more.

The first time he invites Iruka to his house, Iruka’s not sure what to expect. He stands nervously in the entryway before Kakashi guides him to the kitchen, then thinks better of it and leads him to the living room. 

“So,” Kakashi says, tapping his fingers on his knee. “This is my house.”

“Yes,” Iruka says.

Kakashi lets out a soft sigh, slumps back on the couch and threads his fingers through Uhei’s fur to ground himself before he speaks again. “You talk a lot about how your life changed once Mizuki cut your string,” he says. Then, to clarify, “In the meetings.”

“Mhmm.”

Tucking his lip between his teeth, Kakashi makes a small noise of thought. “Did it put you off from the whole idea together? Or, well, not  _ soulmates,  _ I suppose, but having… someone?”

_ Ah. _

Iruka’s jaw drops and he’s halfway to a hysterical laugh at the thought that Kakashi may have somehow convinced himself that he wants to be  _ just friends  _ before he gets himself under control. “I think about it frequently,” he says. He’s spent more than a few recent nights tossing and turning and wishing he could invite Kakashi over, if only just for an hour. He’s not sure he should go so far as to admit  _ that,  _ but he  _ does  _ push a bit. “Sometimes about someone who really,  _ really  _ loves dogs.”

Kakashi flushes a deep, dark red and coughs. “Really?”  
“Really.” Iruka pokes at Kakashi’s shin with his foot before leaning closer and resting a hand on his knee. “You’re about as red as those bonds everyone’s so focused on,” he teases gently.

“Well, I wouldn’t know, now would I?” Kakashi huffs a laugh and tips his head toward Iruka’s. “It doesn’t bother you that we might not be each other’s soulmates?”  
“I think the idea of having a perfect soulmate was crushed along with the rest of me,” Iruka murmurs. “Besides…” He slides his hand a few inches higher as he moves to sit on Kakashi’s free side. “It’d be pretty sad to lead a support group and encourage others to get back out there if I didn’t intend on it myself.”

“Right.” Kakashi’s breath rolls warm across Iruka’s cheeks as he turns their faces together, nuzzles closer. “So about this guy who really loves dogs…”

“Gotta tell you, I’d really love to kiss him,” Iruka whispers, “if he’ll let me.”

Kakashi closes the last inch between them, and with the setting sun warming his face, Iruka gets exactly what he’s wanted since Anko decided to stick her fingers in their business. When they break, he says this, and their laughter mingling becomes his new favorite sound.

**

Being with Iruka is being with the sun. His presence in Kakashi’s life over the months becomes an integral thing, something he can rely on and lose himself in. He is warm and bright, searing through the fog of rough days to pull Kakashi out of himself and into the world once again.

It’s astonishing, really, that someone who is  _ so much  _ could find it in themself to love Kakashi as much as he knows Iruka does.

Kakashi would do anything for him, and frequently does. He helps with the support group, fielding questions from Haku, Anko, and the rest of the group before they can bother Iruka about the future of their relationship. He tells them there’s no use speculating, but the ring hiding in the bottom drawer of his dresser says differently.

It was an impulse buy of an absurd degree, but he’s had it since the day after Iruka had pinned him to the couch only to whisper he loves him. It’s been just over a year and a half since that first coffee date, and he hasn’t asked, only takes out the box on occasion to practice exactly how he wants to.

It needs to be perfect, that’s all he knows.

With Iruka by his side, he can do all things. Their bond is not lacking without that confirmation of destiny. Ultimately, what he wants is Iruka, and he wants Iruka forever.

His proposal, much like their relationship, is a simple one. Uhei nearly knocks the ring from his hand as he kneels, and Kakashi feels tears on Iruka’s cheeks when he gets up to take his face in his hands and kiss him senseless. “It’s just the sun on the water,” Iruka protests, and Kakashi chuckles.

“You’ve always been a shitty liar,” he says between kisses, breaking away to run the back of his hand across Iruka’s cheeks. “But you’re  _ my  _ shitty liar, and I want to hear you fail at it for the rest of our lives.”

Iruka laughs and shoves him away before pulling him back in the next second, holding his hand out behind Kakashi’s back to admire the ring. “I’ll accept it,” he says, “but only since this means I’m allowed to tease you back. You know that, right?”

“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Kakashi says, and when they marry eight months later, he reminds Iruka of this with his vows. “To have, to hold, to lovingly tease—maa, Iruka, I  _ told  _ you—”

When they wake up the next morning, it’s to their same familiar routine. Kakashi tips his head forward to rest his temple against Iruka’s, kisses the tip of his nose, and then settles under Iruka’s chin to press his lips to Iruka’s throat to wake him.

“Morning,” Iruka murmurs today, wrapping his arms around Kakashi. “‘S a little early.”

“Mm.”

“What’s up, love?”

“Too early for talking,” Kakashi says softly. There’s a growing pressure in his chest that’s hard to ignore, a storm filled with all their quiet moments and hushed midnight confessions, and he clings tighter to Iruka—his  _ husband—  _ in the gentle morning light. Uhei’s weight pulls the blanket tight around their feet and today, as he does every day, Kakashi marvels at the way this house has become a home.

“I’m really glad you asked me to coffee,” Iruka whispers against Kakashi’s hair. “And I hope you know that what we have means more to me than any red string.”

Kakashi nods.

“Everything okay?”

Swallowing hard, Kakashi nods again, because it  _ is.  _ He feels every bit like an exposed nerve, and the world outside is huge, and he’ll never know for sure if fate’s chosen them to be together, but…

But.

They’ve made this life, this  _ bond,  _ theirs, and that’s far more precious than any red string. 


End file.
